Everything Is Alright
by RockShrimpTempora
Summary: Lance gets badly hurt on what was supposed to be an easy mission.
1. Chapter 1

The first thing Lance feels when he comes to is pain. He can barely breathe with the sheer force of it all. He blinks a few times to clear his blurry vision to realize he's in the cockpit of Blue. _How did I get here?_ He can't quite remember what happened but he turns his head to the right and knows he is laying on the floor right behind the pilots' chair. He turns his head to the left and sees his helmet laying about a foot away from his head. Now that he's looking at the helmet he can hear muffled voices coming from inside. As he moves his arm to get the helmet his side explodes in pain. He has to close his eyes as a wave of nausea hits him hard. _Wha..._ his thoughts are cut off as he lifts his head and sees a ragged piece of metal from god knows where sticking out of his side, accompanied by what only he would categorize as a 'shit ton of blood' pooling underneath him. _Oh.. well I guess I found out where all the pain is coming from.._ he thinks grimly. He feels Blue's presence in his mind, the worry rolling off her in waves. _I'm okay girl_ he communicates through the bond.

Slowly he lifts his arm and reaches for his helmet once more, careful as to not aggravate his side any more than necessary. As he makes the reach he can see how much his hand is shaking. Finally reaching far enough to get his helmet he puts it on his head and is overwhelmed by five voices all at once.

"Can you hear us Lance?

"Lance Lance Lance!"

"LANCE! LANCE DO YOU COPY"

"Lance come on buddy please be okay please answer"

"Shit shit shit fuck come on Lance!"

He closes his eyes and talks into the comms, "Hey guys.." it comes out more of a raspy whisper than his normal voice but it does the trick just fine. Now everyone is louder than ever all talking over each other in a panic to find out more information. He hears Shiro over the rest of the voices telling everyone to quiet down.

"Lance, it's Shiro. Can you hear me? Are you okay? We're headed towards you right now." he can clearly hear the worry in the Black Paladin's voice. Lance wonders how long he's been lying there. Then it hits him, they were on a mission to fight a small fleet of Galra ships.

There were only a handful of enemy ships so they decided to fight without forming Voltron. Everything was going according to plan until Keith jumped out of formation to chase after a stray ship and left his side wide open for an attack he didn't see coming. Lance pushed on his controls hard without so much as a thought and managed to push the Red Lion out of the way and took a hit from one of the Galra's high tech laser guns. It shut Blue's system down immediately, Lance went spiraling out of control, headed right for planet they were trying to protect.

"It hurts…" was all he could manage to moan in response. Lance could feel his vision start to go blurry as shivers racked his injured body. He knows he should probably stay awake but its becoming increasingly more difficult as the shivering gets slightly rougher. He feels Blue in his head once again this time sending him feelings of calm desperate to help any way a giant sentient space lion can. _Thanks Blue, I'm just gonna close my eyes for a bit…_ he thinks as he hears the commotion of landing ships all around Blue's prone form.


	2. Chapter 2

Keith is the first one to bolt out of his Lion and straight towards the crash site. He can still hear Lance's ragged breathing through the comms and it really has him worried. He is almost at the Blue Lion now as he breaks into a sprint running as fast as his legs will take him, heart beating out of his chest. He works his way to the cockpit and the smell of burnt wires and blood hits him and hits him hard. Keith is frozen in shock for a moment at the image before him.

Lance is on his back with a growing pool of blood under him, the piece of shrapnel still lodged in his side. He has cuts and bruises on almost all of the skin that isn't protected by his armor an his normally tanned skin is a sickly pale color. He's shaking hard as he looks up and sees Keith standing there staring. He squints and opens his mouth to whisper, "Keith...?" and that all it takes to snap Keith out of it and close the distance between the two.

Keith lands hard on his knees next to Lance almost afraid to touch him with the fear of making Lance's injuries worse. "Lance! Hey, hey it's okay I'm here I've got you. Oh God, shit shit shit!" He cups Lance's cheek with one hand trying to get his eyes to focus on his face. After a few ticks Lance is able to semi-focus his eyes on Keith's, his eyes having a glazed look to them.

Keith was so focused on Lance that he didn't hear Shiro make his way to the cockpit. He only was aware of the Black Paladin's arrival when Shiro placed a firm hand on his shoulder to get him to move over so he could assess the damage himself. "Pidge, Hunk I need you guys to be on the look out to make sure there aren't any more enemy ships around, Keith I need you to keep Lance still." Shiro's voice was firm but gentle, making sure Keith had his attention before proceeding. He removed his hands from Lance's cheek and firmly held on to his shoulders never breaking eye contact. Before Keith could even process what was happening, Shiro yanked the piece of metal out of Lance's side and tosses it as far out of the way as possible applying pressure the wound. The Blue Paladin's scream was quite possibly the worst sound Keith had ever heard. It didn't last long before his eyes rolled to the back of his head and he was completely still. "Allura. I need you to get the Castle as close to the planet as you can and have a healing pod ready." Shiro's voice had an edge to it as he spoke into the comms.

"Paladins I'm afraid we have a problem" Allura's shaky voice replied, "the Castle took a big hit during battle and shut down power to a large portion of the ship. The pods are going to be inaccessible until we can get our main systems functioning again."

Keith was at a loss for words. He knows if they wait any longer Lance could die right here in the cockpit of his Lion on some unknown planet. It looks like Shiro had come to the same conclusion as well if the look on his face was anything to go by. "I didn't think it would come to this but desperate times calls for desperate measures" the Black Paladin looks up and makes eye contact with Keith before looking down at his prosthetic arm as he pulls it away from Lance's wound. The arm is glowing purple now and Keith watches in mixed awe and horror as Shiro moves his arm down again pressing his glowing hand against Lance's side immediately cauterizing the wound. Lance is still out cold and even though that worries Keith he thanks god for small favors. With a sigh of relief Shiro sits back and Keith watches him take a minute to collect himself as his arm cools down. The Red Paladin eases his hands off of Lance's shoulders and into his hair instead delicately running his fingers through it. He needs to keep touching Lance, reassuring himself that he is alive.

Lance's face twitches slightly at the motion but he remains unconscious. Keith leans as close to his injured teammate as he dares and whispers, "I'm sorry." He can't believe this was all because he got cocky and thought he could handle a stray Galra ship on his own during a battle.


	3. Chapter 3

"Lanc…. wake up …. me buddy. Com….on Lance, open….. eyes." Lance can hear Shiro but it sounds like he's underwater. _Are we swimming?_ He thinks but Blue's concern buzzes in his head and he knows that's not right. At this point he's starting to become aware, things are clearer he can hear Keith whispering that he's so sorry God is he sorry. _That's weird Keith is never apologetic…_ Lance is still coming to and he feels so cold. He doesn't understand why but he knows he should probably open his eyes soon.

"Mm'c-cold" It comes out as a whisper, heavily slurred as he scrunches his eyebrows and shivers begin coursing through his body once more.

"Lance… please can you open your eyes?" Shiro sounds desperate now so Lance tries to do so. His eyelids are so heavy though. It takes a few tries but finally he's able to open his eyes halfway. Blue sends him her feelings of pride, giving him the encouragement he needs to stay awake. He then has the opportunity to take in his surroundings, he sees Keith and Shiro both in his line of vision. The look relieved to see his eyes but they are both ghostly pale. He realizes he's lying on the cold metal floor of Blue and he feels how much his whole body hurts every time he shivers. He's more lucid now and he remembers everything that has got him to this point. A whimper slips from his lips as his body racks with shivers causing white hot pain to shoot up through his side. His eyes screw closed as his breath hitches in his chest. Somebody drapes something over his body and he barely registers that it was Keith's jacket. He feels like he can't breathe. "Hey hey hey Lance it's going to be okay we really just need you to relax okay? I know it hurts bud, you're doing such a good job." He feels fingers gently carding through his hair, _Keith_ he thinks. Tears sting the corners of his eyes from the pain he feels like his body is betraying him.

"M sorry" he slurs, his tongue feeling heavy in his mouth. He's not sure how much longer he can stay awake for. He is fighting the pain so hard trying to stay with Keith and Shiro. He wants to do what Shiro asked of him desperately fighting the exhaustion and the pain. His eyes drift open once more slowly and only halfway, but they're open. He makes eye contact with Keith, he wishes he could tell him how much he cares for him, or at least make a halfhearted joke about getting blood on Keith's favorite jacket but he can't find enough energy to do anything but keep his eyes open. He keeps his eyes on Keith as Shiro moves closer to his body.

"Shh Lance it's okay, you have nothing to be sorry for alright? I know this is sudden but I want to get you back to the Castle okay? We are too vulnerable out in the open." He then takes his eyes off of Lance and looks at Keith. "Keith? I need you to grab Lance and take him in Red. I'll follow behind carrying Blue with Black, are we clear? Pidge, Hunk? You guys still stay on high alert. We move in formation back to the Castle." Keith stared at Shiro with wide eyes and all he could do was send him a curt nod in response, too overwhelmed to do anything else as he heard the strained voices of his other teammates agreeing with the plan through the comms.

Keith as gently as he could manage tries to lift Lance up off the floor and attempt a bridal carry. The moment Keith gets Lance in a sitting position the Blue Paladin's eyes fly open for a split second before squeezing shut and he lets out the most horrible scream Keith has ever heard. Too late to turn back Keith quickly gets him off the floor and hurries as fast as his body will take him outside of Blue's cockpit and into Red's. For the duration of their short journey to Red, Lance is shaking harder than he was before and it has Keith hugging Lance as close to his body as possible trying to share as much of his warmth as he can. "Lance it's okay, I've got you. I'm so sorry." Keith is saying this on loop not quite sure if he is trying to convince Lance or himself. He lets out a sigh of relief as red opens her cockpit to him.

Lance feels Keith lower him to the floor as gently as possible. He doesn't want Keith to leave him so with what little energy he has left, he grips on the Keith's shirt and doesn't let go. In a small voice that doesn't sound at all like his own he whispers, "please don't leave me…" Keith looks him in the eyes for a second before responding with a slight nod. Keith must have communicated with Red that she'll have to take over piloting for the trip back to the Castle because Red starts to lift off the ground gently without so much as a word.


End file.
